An engaging and moving novel about the emotional toll warfare takes on both soldiers and their families.
In Mach’s historical novel, a young girl’s father returns home from World War II a changed man.
As the story opens, a young girl named Irene Bracken is riding with her mother in a borrowed car to meet Irene’s father, a soldier returning from the Second World War. Irene is excited, as are all of those gathered waiting for a loved one to return, and her father is warmly embraced by his family and his little town of Midland Valley. But it isn’t long before cracks begin to appear: The persona of the cheerful and easy-going Daddy Irene remembers increasingly seems like an act Mr. Bracken is trying to maintain, and underneath this mask is an angry and frightened man, someone whose experiences in the war have wounded him in invisible ways. While the narrative largely follows Irene as she goes about the normal activities of a young girl in a small town, it also returns regularly to the unavoidable reality that Mr. Bracken is fighting an inner battle—and largely losing it. “We’d have been better off if he’d never come home,” Irene’s friend MaryEllen says at one point about her own ex-soldier father. “At least then Momma would have a check from the gov’ment.” Irene’s worries reach a peak when her father opts for electroshock therapy, and Mach’s decision to narrate these tense and dark events from the perspective of a young girl ends up paying off wonderfully. Irene is innocent but tough (“I hope he feels the sear of my gaze,” she thinks about a boy in her class who’s just assumed the class girls won’t play in the upcoming baseball game, “because I am ready to broil him in hot flames”); readers will immediately bond with and relate to her, even when she’s privately her suffering father’s harshest critic.
An engaging and moving novel about the emotional toll warfare takes on both soldiers and their families.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9798991208840
Page Count: 232
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.
In Florence’s middle-grade fantasy novel, a young girl’s heart is tested in the face of an evil, spreading Darkness.
Eleven-year-old Lydia, “freckle-cheeked and round-eyed, with hair the color of pine bark and fair skin,” is struggling with the knowledge that she has reached the age to apprentice as an herbalist. Lydia is reluctant to leave her beloved, magical Mulberry Glen and her cozy Housetree in the woods—she’ll miss Garder, the Glen’s respected philosopher; her fairy guardian Pit; her human friend Livy; and even the mischievous part-elf, part-imp, part-human twins Zale and Zamilla. But the twins go missing after hearing of a soul-sapping Darkness that has swallowed a forest and is creeping into minds and engulfing entire towns. They have secretly left to find a rare fruit that, it is said, will stop the Darkness if thrown into the heart of the mountain that rises out of the lethal forest. Lydia follows, determined to find the twins before they, too, fall victim to the Darkness. During her journey, accompanied by new friends, she gradually realizes that she herself has a dangerous role to play in the quest to stop the Darkness. In this well-crafted fantasy, Florence skillfully equates the physical manifestation of Darkness with the feelings of insecurity and powerlessness that Lydia first struggles with when thinking of leaving the Glen. Such negative thoughts grow more intrusive the closer she and her friends come to the Darkness—and to Lydia’s ultimate, powerfully rendered test of character, which leads to a satisfyingly realistic, not quite happily-ever-after ending. Highlights include a delightfully haunting, reality-shifting library and a deft sprinkling of Latin throughout the text; Pit’s pet name for Lydia is mea flosculus (“my little flower”). Fine-lined ink drawings introducing each chapter add a pleasing visual element to this well-grounded fairy tale.
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781956393095
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Waxwing Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An emotional, much-needed historical graphic novel.
Sandy and his family, Japanese Canadians, experience hatred and incarceration during World War II.
Sandy Saito loves baseball, and the Vancouver Asahi ballplayers are his heroes. But when they lose in the 1941 semifinals, Sandy’s dad calls it a bad omen. Sure enough, in December 1941, Japan bombs Pearl Harbor in the U.S. The Canadian government begins to ban Japanese people from certain areas, moving them to “dormitories” and setting a curfew. Sandy wants to spend time with his father, but as a doctor, his dad is busy, often sneaking out past curfew to work. One night Papa is taken to “where he [is] needed most,” and the family is forced into an internment camp. Life at the camp isn’t easy, and even with some of the Asahi players playing ball there, it just isn’t the same. Trying to understand and find joy again, Sandy struggles with his new reality and relationship with his father. Based on the true experiences of Japanese Canadians and the Vancouver Asahi team, this graphic novel is a glimpse of how their lives were affected by WWII. The end is a bit abrupt, but it’s still an inspiring and sweet look at how baseball helped them through hardship. The illustrations are all in a sepia tone, giving it an antique look and conveying the emotions and struggles. None of the illustrations of their experiences are overly graphic, making it a good introduction to this upsetting topic for middle-grade readers.
An emotional, much-needed historical graphic novel. (afterword, further resources) (Graphic historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5253-0334-0
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2021
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